The Trials of Margaret Clitherow: Persecution, Martyrdom and the Politics of Sanctity in Elizabethan England

This is a new biography of a Catholic martyr exploring the complicated and controversial story of her demise. The story of Margaret Clitherow represents one of the most important yet troubling events in post-Reformation history. Her trial, execution and subsequent legend have provoked controversy ever since it became a cause celebre in the time of Elizabeth I. Through extensive new research into the contemporary accounts of her arrest and trial the authors have pieced together a new reading of the surrounding events. The result is a work which considers the question of religious sainthood and martyrdom as well as the relationship between society, the state and the Church in Britain during the C16th. They establish the full ideological significance of the trial and demonstrate that the politics of post-Reformation British society cannot be understood without the wider local, national and international contexts in which they occurred. This is a major contribution to our understanding of both English Catholicism and the Protestant regime of the Elizabethan period.

Table of Contents:
Acknowledgements; Preface; Abbreviations; 1. The Controversial Mrs Clitherow; 2. The Radicalisation of the mid-Elizabethan Catholics; 3. Mrs Clitherow, her Catholic household and her Catholic enemies; 4. The Quarrels of the Catholic Community; 5. Recusancy and its Discontents; 6. Thomas Bell and his Enemies; 7. Christianity sans Eglise: the Religion of the Heart among Catholics and Puritans; 8. Fainthearted Catholics and Real Catholics: Mrs Clitherow and the Local Politics of Conformity; 9. The Reckoning: Arrest, Trial and Execution; 10. Mad, Bad and Dangerous to Know?; 11. Appealing to the Court of Public Opinion; 12. Endgame: from Life to Death / Mrs Clitherow and the Catholic Community after 1586; 13. Aftermath of Execution; 14. The Tyrant and the Quisling; 15. Between Resistance and Compromise? Thomas Bell's Revenge and the 1591 Proclamation; 16. Thomas Bell changes Sides; 17. Acting on Information received; 18. Reading against the Grain; or what Thomas Bell had really been doing in Lancashire Clitherow Vindicated; The Church under the Cross and the Resort to the Public; 19. Thomas Bell and the Politics of Failure; 20. Mrs Clitherow entirely vindicated as the Epitome of Catholic Order; Aftermath; Bibliography; Conclusion; Index.

About the Author :
Peter Lake is University Distinguished Professor of History and Professor of the History of Christianity, Divinity School at Vanderbilt University, USA. From 1993-2009 he was Professor of History at Princeton University, USA. He is the author of many books including The Boxmaker's Revenge and a forthcoming volume on Shakespeare's history plays. Michael Questier is Professor of Early Modern History at Queen Mary, University of London, UK. He is the author of Catholicism and Community in Early Modern England (CUP), Conversion, Politics and Religion in England 1580-1625 (CUP), and co-authored with Peter Lake The Antichrist's Lewd Hat: Protestants, Papists and Players in Post-Reformation England (Yale).

Review :
... a major achievement. It transforms current interpretations of the bitter inter- and inter-confessional disputes engendered by the English Reformation [and] illuminates the ideological struggles through which recusancy became the defining hallmark of early modern Catholic identity...--Sanford Lakoff ... an interesting addition to the historical canon that shows the so-called "Golden Age" was in fact heavily characterised by a frenzy of persecution.--Sanford Lakoff 'It is not a work about a saint so much as a very skilfully argued analysis of religious politics... This book exposes not sanctity so much as the confusion, conflict and misery of a beleaguered minority, and the damage wrought by political imperatives on quiet faith.'--Sanford Lakoff 'The authors do a superb job of analysing these fault line. They take the time to place Clitherow's story in the context of her family life and political events but they are not afraid of drawing broader conclusions. In their hands Clitherow's sorry tale reasserts itself as one of the most important prisms through which to view the puzzling internecine struggles of Elizabethan Catholicism as well as the contours of early-modern martyrdom. We'll continue to argue about Clitherow; was she saintly or stubborn? The best place to begin any study of this conundrum is this outstanding book.'--Sanford Lakoff 'The narrative is detailed and intriguing, because Lake and Questier have turned up a wealth of new evidence to defend their case. Thanks to this, we enter the world of Elizabethan religious politics in all its intensity. Who are the heroes and who the villains? The scholarly debate is advanced by this book, and is set to run still further.'--Sanford Lakoff [a] lively new book... [the authors's] sensible approach is to devote short chapters to each particular grouping of issues... there are compelling ideas at play here... while this is a work that will resonate with Tudor historians, it is as interesting to a lay reader both for its historiographic approach and how it traces the workings of the polity.--Sanford Lakoff Learned but well written and accessible, this book succeeds in bringing back some of the excitement and danger to the debates... The Trials of Margaret Clitherow is a book that needs to be read. If one wants a real idea of what was going on among Catholics at the time, then drop the sickly sweet hagiographies and read this excellent effort.--Sanford Lakoff ... a major achievement. It transforms currentinterpretations of the bitter inter- and inter-confessional disputes engenderedby the English Reformation [and] illuminates the ideological struggles throughwhich recusancy became the defining hallmark of early modern Catholic identity...--,